Easier
by x.lithium
Summary: TezukaFuji; Six years after he gave up on their relationship, Tezuka asks Fuji a question and finds that he doesn't like Fuji's answer as much as he thought he would.


If Prince of Tennis were mine, Momo would eat an Inui-juice-burger cause he's always hungry like that.

**EASIER  
x.**lithium**x.**lithium**x.**lithium**; **  
_I'm standing here, but you don't see me, I'd give it all for that to change;  
standing out in the rain, knowing that it's really over, please don't leave me alone;  
(before the storm - nick jonas featuring miley cyrus)_

Because life without Fuji was as unimaginable now as it had been six years ago, they still met twice every week at nameless cafes. Sometimes they talked about his beating Echizen at the last Grand Slam Final, other times they talked about Fuji's latest photo shoot. Most of the time he stared into Fuji's eyes until the need to hold the other man became too overwhelming, and he had to sip his coffee to shove the urge back down into his system.

Tezuka knew better than to convince himself that they were still together, but sometimes it was easy. They still slept together, once every two months, but he supposed it was more bodily lust than anything else. Tezuka didn't date, but Fuji did. American supermodels and Japanese singers, but only for a week or so. Never long enough to have slept with them. For reasons Tezuka didn't quite understand, this thought comforted him, knowing that he was still the only one Fuji came to for relief.

Tezuka's logical side still wished Fuji would stop coming to him, it made things additionally complicating and wasn't that why they broke up? It was easier to be apart than it was to be together. It had been a quiet afternoon that Echizen had kissed him, right in front of Fuji.

Tezuka hadn't kissed him back, pushed him away, in fact. But once Echizen had left, Fuji had smiled sadly. "_It's always going to be like this, ne, Tezuka? It's like no one wants us to be together._" Tezuka hadn't disagreed. There were his parents, Fuji's parents, the whole world once both of them became known. It had been from his own lips, not Fuji's, that the final words had been spoken. His arms had been crossed and for a second, Fuji looked like he might shatter and break and fly away in every direction, because Fuji ignored and ran away from the truth when it was an inconvenient one.

"_It'll be easier, like this. Easier._"

It was hard to be apart from Fuji, but it was still by far easier than being _with _Fuji.

"Why are you dating her?" Fuji's eyelashes fluttered delicately from their resting spot on Fuji's pale cheeks at Tezuka's voice, and Tezuka could remember the time when he had been allowed to kiss those cheeks. Not the nameless supermodels that Fuji dated now.

The man in front of him, who Tezuka knew was no longer the boy he had been, let his lips curve upwards into a sly smile that contradicted the bashful shine of Fuji's blue eyes. Fuji shifted in a way that could be considered seductive or adorably uncomfortable, depending on whether you were judging by the look of his eyes or his smile. "She's easy on the eyes, I suppose."

Fuji's answer unsettled Tezuka more than he would ever like to admit. It wasn't the answer he had wanted. How his body had leaned forward so that their mouths were a breath away was lost on Tezuka, but Fuji was oh so close and the prodigy's scent was like a drug. "Tell you love her, tell me we don't need each other." Fuji closed his eyes and told Tezuka what he needed to hear in between kisses and soft moans.

He always had been a liar.

--

Echizen had grown out of what Fuji had dubbed his Tezuka-phase. He had matured and married Sakuno, although he had never been able to put an end to his _Mada mada dane_s every time they walked out of a tennis stadium together. Still, Echizen was no longer blatantly obvious in his attraction towards Tezuka, therefore Tezuka decided it was safe to go over to Echizen's when he was asked over for lunch. What Echizen hadn't told him was that Fuji was also there, and from the look on Fuji's face, he had not been notified, either.

It was a deviation from their usual two-days-a-week-or-less schedule that they had religiously followed since their break up, and Tezuka's stomach stirred nervously when he sat down beside the prodigy.

Tezuka didn't remember at all what the three of them had been discussing for over an hour, but the moment Echizen left the room, Tezuka jumped on Fuji. He wasn't quite sure what was happening, but Fuji was moaning and panting and chanting his name underneath him. Mid-thrust, Fuji's phone rang and the familiar ringtone for Fuji's girlfriend-of-the-week registered itself in Tezuka's mind. He almost paused, but Fuji purred his name and marked Tezuka's collarbone with his teeth, although he had not done so for over six years.

The second time the ringtone came on, Fuji picked up the phone and hurled it across the room. Both of them came simultaneously.

Echizen crossed his arms and leaned against the doorway as the two of them picked up their clothes with fumbling hands. More out of lack of anything to say than anything else, Tezuka thought, Echizen nudged a pillow Tezuka remembered tossing out of his way with his feet and smirked. "Che, Fuji-senpai could have beaten us _both _in tennis if he'd decided to go pro."

--

The next time they met at a cafe was silent and awkward and Fuji's didn't open his eyes once. Because he knew he would lose Fuji from his life altogether if he didn't say anything, his mouth blurted of its own accord, "Do you want to walk to the park with me?"

Fuji's eyes opened so slowly Tezuka was forced to exhale the breath he had not known he had been holding. Fuji nodded.

At the park they ran into more figures from their past than Tezuka had seen in the past two years. Atobe declared that Ore-sama would never touch such dirty commonplace objects when Jiroh begged the diva to push his swing for him, but at Jiroh's childish plead, Atobe relented and even ended up letting Jiroh drag him to the slide, sit the diva down on the swing and deposit himself into Atobe's lap before sliding down the plaything.

Tezuka would never admit that he had more or less eavesdropped on Atobe and Jiroh's conversation, but Atobe had looked so nervous that Tezuka couldn't help but listen. Apparently, Ore-sama was leaving for America on a business trip and he knew that Jiroh would rather stay in Japan and sleep because Atobe always had to move around to meetings during his business trips buthereallywantedJirohtobewithhim. Jiroh had simply laughed at Atobe and stated that yes, he did love sleeping but being with Atobe was the best.

The other pair he and Fuji ran into was Yukimura and Sanada. The ex-Rikkai dai buchou and fukubuchou were simply sitting on a hill, watching the sky and holding hands. Because it needed to be asked, Tezuka leaned in closer to Fuji and with a clammy hand, took Fuji's smaller one in his.

"Is this really easier?"

Tezuka thought that it was because Fuji didn't have an answer that the smaller man led Tezuka to his house and lowered his mouth onto Tezuka's length until Tezuka could do nothing but attempt to keep his waist still and clench his hands on Fuji's hair and bedsheets. For the fourth time that month, Tezuka slept with Fuji.

For the first time in six years, they did it slowly and more than once in one night.

--

After their last rendezvous, Tezuka neither called Fuji or was called by Fuji to meet up at a cafe for three weeks until he played enough tennis in one night to bring up the courage to call the tensai. Fuji sounded surprised, but not altogether shocked when Tezuka asked him to come to his house. Fuji agreed and Tezuka practically sprinted out to the tennis courts to hit the tennis ball against the wall a few more times before Fuji arrived.

The first thing he said when Fuji opened the door was, "This is easier, but it isn't more fulfilling. Not for me."

Fuji was looking at the ground when he spoke, "It is for me."

Tezuka touched Fuji's cheek and spoke only when he had Fuji pinned against his bedsheets panting and moaning that he marked Fuji's neck, quite high up so that nothing less than a scarf would hide it. "You always were a liar," he said, pressed against Fuji's lips as if he could slip the words in between Fuji's teeth and make him say the words back. "Tell me what you want,"

Fuji's eyes clenched when Tezuka dragged his fingertips slowly down the tensai's chest, "Honest answer, or dishonest?" Tezuka propped himself up on his elbows, murmuring for for Fuji to go with the first option. Fuji relaxed in his hold. Opening his blue eyes, Fuji smiled up at Tezuka, wrapping his arms around Tezuka's neck and his legs around his waist. "I want _you_. I want to break up with her and come with you when you go to your tournaments. I don't want you to leave me behind. I don't want things to be easy. Not like this."

Tezuka thought that it was the blue of Fuji's eyes that made Tezuka believe him.

--

Sigh, I think I'm dying.


End file.
